The local Magistrate's Court was a grand, imposing structure made of solid white marble. It was designed to host the most serious, high-stakes legal disputes in the cultivation world.
It was not designed to host a horse-sized, acid-spitting hellhound.
Mr. Wiggles sat in the center of the courtroom floor, happily panting. His fiery tail wagged, leaving scorch marks on the ancient marble tiles. Every time he drooled, a small cloud of toxic green smoke hissed into the air.
Sitting behind the towering, elevated judge's bench was Magistrate Chen. The poor man looked like he hadn't slept in a decade. He was currently massaging his temples with both hands, staring down at the monster, and then looking at the two opposing counsel tables.
At the left table sat Elder Yang-Claw, his arms crossed, glaring across the aisle. Next to him sat my boss, Lo Yu, who was casually packing his bamboo pipe and looking entirely too smug.
At the right table, I sat next to Fairy Yin-Fang. She was dabbing her eyes with a silk handkerchief.
"Let the record show," Magistrate Chen droned, his voice echoing in the massive hall, "that we are gathered to determine the primary custody of... a Class-Four Abyssal Hellhound. Representing the husband is Senior Lo. Representing the wife is Litigation Master He."
Magistrate Chen stopped reading. He looked at me. He looked at Lo Yu.
"You two work at the same firm," Chen stated flatly. "This is a massive conflict of interest."
"Objection, Your Honor," I stood up, adjusting my cheap grey tunic like a tailored suit. "The Lo & He Law Firm operates with strict internal firewalls. My boss and I have not spoken about this case. We are fierce, independent legal rivals."
Across the aisle, Lo Yu winked at me. I winked back. We were going to rob these people blind.
"Fine," Chen sighed, waving his hand. "Senior Lo, you have the floor. Prove why the husband deserves custody."
Lo Yu stood up slowly. He didn't bring a stack of legal scrolls. He just reached into his robes and pulled out a small, airtight leather pouch. He unzipped it and dramatically pulled out the dusty green silk hair ribbon he had stolen from Yang-Claw's cave.
Yin-Fang gasped. "My ribbon! I was looking for that!"
"Your Honor," Lo Yu rasped, holding the ribbon up to the light. "The court must consider the emotional environment of the child. During my rigorous inspection of the husband's dwelling, I discovered this discarded artifact. I conducted a deep, spiritual olfactory analysis."
Lo Yu pressed the ribbon to his face and inhaled deeply. Magistrate Chen looked mildly nauseated.
"It smells of neglect," Lo Yu declared, lowering the ribbon. "It lacks the warm, nurturing Yin-essence required to stabilize a demonic beast. Fairy Yin-Fang abandoned her post! She left her husband in a cave of pure, suffocating Yang! How can she care for a three-headed hellhound when she cannot even maintain the ambient musk of her own household?!"
"Objection!" I shouted, slamming my hands on the table. "Opposing counsel is using junk science! I conducted my own highly technical structural integrity tests on my client's undergarment drawer just yesterday!"
Yang-Claw's eyepatch twitched. "You did what to my wife's drawer?"
"I checked the aerodynamics of her lace!" I yelled back, entirely shameless. "And I found it completely optimized for a nurturing environment! Your Honor, my client buys Mr. Wiggles organic tofu! Meanwhile, Elder Yang-Claw forces the poor child to sleep on a pile of bloody bones! It's a safety hazard! What if Mr. Wiggles swallows a femur splinter?!"
"He's a hellhound!" Yang-Claw roared, standing up. "He melts the bones in his throat!"
"He has a sensitive stomach!" Yin-Fang shrieked, slamming her hands on her table.
Mr. Wiggles looked back and forth between his screaming parents. His left head whimpered. His right head sneezed a small fireball that caught the edge of my legal pad. I quickly patted it out.
"Silence!" Magistrate Chen bellowed, slamming his wooden gavel. A shockwave of Qi rolled through the room, forcing everyone back into their seats.
Chen rubbed his face. He looked at the sizzling holes in his marble floor. He looked at the two lawyers actively trying to scam a 30% contingency fee from a divorce.
"This court cannot rely on the testimony of degenerates," Chen declared tiredly. "The law is clear. When the parents cannot agree, and the beast is of high intelligence, the court will allow the beast to choose its primary caregiver."
The crowd in the public gallery murmured. It was the classic custody trope.
"Elder Yang-Claw, Fairy Yin-Fang," Chen commanded. "Stand on opposite ends of the room. Call the hound. Whomever he goes to, gets full custody."
Yang-Claw grinned triumphantly. He marched to the left side of the room and pulled a massive, bloody ribcage out of his spatial ring. "Come here, boy! Come to Papa! I got fresh Outer Court disciple ribs!"
Yin-Fang rushed to the right side of the room, holding up a pristine porcelain bowl. "Mr. Wiggles! Mommy has your mashed tofu! Come get your soft proteins!"
Mr. Wiggles sat in the middle of the floor. All three heads looked deeply conflicted. The middle head drooled looking at the bloody ribs. The right head sniffed the air toward the tofu. The beast whined, taking a half-step to the left, then a half-step to the right.
Suddenly, the heavy wooden doors at the back of the courtroom creaked open.
The goat walked in.
It had a piece of a shredded subpoena hanging out of its mouth. It chewed slowly, its rectangular pupils completely unbothered by the grand legal setting. It trotted down the center aisle, aiming directly for the defense table.
Mr. Wiggles froze.
The terrifying Abyssal Hellhound entirely ignored the bloody ribs. He ignored the organic tofu. He turned around, his fiery tail wagging so fast it created a small tornado.
Mr. Wiggles bounded across the courtroom, completely bypassing both of his owners. He skidded to a halt right in front of the cross-eyed goat.
The goat stopped chewing. It looked up at the three-headed monster.
The goat let out a single, flat bleat.
Baa.
Mr. Wiggles instantly dropped to the floor, rolling over onto his back and exposing his soft, vulnerable belly. All three heads let out happy, submissive little yips.
The goat calmly stepped over the hellhound, stood on top of Mr. Wiggles' stomach, and went back to chewing the subpoena.
The entire courtroom was dead silent.
Yang-Claw dropped the bloody ribs. Yin-Fang dropped the tofu.
"Well," Magistrate Chen said, leaning back in his chair and picking up his gavel. "The beast has chosen. The court grants full custody of the Abyssal Hellhound to the cross-eyed goat."
"Wait, what?!" I yelled.
"You can't do that!" Yang-Claw roared.
"I just did," Chen said smoothly. "The Lo & He Law Firm is now the legal guardian of this biological weapon. Court adjourned."
BANG.
Chen stood up and practically sprinted out of the side door before anyone could argue.
I stood in the middle of the courtroom, staring at the goat, which was currently using a three-headed demon dog as a sofa. I looked at Lo Yu.
"Boss," I whispered in horror. "We don't have the budget to feed a hellhound."
"Relax, Junior Associate," Lo Yu grinned, smoothly sliding the sixty-stone retainer fee from Yin-Fang's table into his robes. "We won't feed it. We will simply charge the parents a daily visitation fee. Joint custody is a beautiful, profitable thing."
Miles away, in the Eastern District, the rain had finally stopped.
Senior Brother Bai stood at the wooden gates of the Velvet Hoof Beast-Taming Sect. It didn't look like a grand martial arts academy. It looked like a massive, muddy farm. The smell of wet hay and animal manure was overpowering.
Bai didn't flinch. His eyes burned with Shounen determination.
An Outer Court disciple in overalls walked up to the gate, holding a clipboard. He looked at Bai's ruined silver robes and the chewed-up scabbard on his back.
"You're the new transfer?" the disciple asked, raising an eyebrow. "The guy who got demoted?"
"I am Bai," he said firmly, his voice devoid of his former arrogance. "I am here to learn the Dao."
The disciple snorted. "Right. Well, grab a pitchfork. And meet your partner."
The disciple whistled. A small, scruffy brown goat trotted out of the mud. It wasn't majestic. It had a chunk missing from its left ear and a severe overbite.
It walked up to Bai and headbutted his shin.
Bai slowly dropped to one knee. The mud soaked into his expensive silk pants, but he didn't care. He looked the scruffy goat directly in the eyes.
"They laughed at me," Bai whispered to the goat, the dramatic tension in the air thicker than the smell of manure. "They thought I was weak. But together, we will show them. We will reach the apex."
The brown goat stared at him. Then, it aggressively tried to eat his silver belt buckle.
"Yes," Bai nodded solemnly, completely misinterpreting the animal's hunger as martial spirit. "Your hunger for the blade is strong. I will temper you. I will become the greatest goat-lover this world has ever seen."
The Shounen protagonist had found his calling.